Stormy Pattern…

All the talk is of the developing stormy pattern next week but we really have been treated to some wonderful December weather these last few days…and it will continue for a couple more. SW winds will kick up a bit tomorrow mixing the atmosphere and giving us a marginal warm-up…temps should approach 50 degrees in the afternoon with a lot of sunshine once again. A cold front will then slip through early Saturday morning and northerly winds will escort colder air back into the region.

The cold will establish itself Saturday night before cloud cover takes over. Clouds will thicken up early Sunday morning, blocking out the sun and warming will be tough to come by. A weak wave of low pressure will develop south of us on the cold front setting up an overrunning precip event late Sunday through Monday morning.

With the cold air in place at the start, I expect snow to break-out for almost all locals Sunday afternoon…unfortunately, with warming aloft, it will not stay all snow and mixing and even a change to all rain will occur Sunday night. The transition will occur from south to north starting in the early evening for locals south of the Pike and ending by midnight for locals near the NH border. Without a very organized system, precip should be on the lighter side so only coatings to a couple of inches of snow are expected to accumulate before a changeover.

The cold air will be tough to move and scour out of the lower levels across interior Southern New England and a coating of ice is likely on top of the layer of snow. The all snow zone will be confined to Northern New England and may be as much as 6″. The storm system will slide away on Monday morning and late Monday through Tuesday night will we will be in-between storm systems.

The second system will likely be a larger one, with more upper level support. The result will be a solid Nor’easter type storm capable of significant amounts of snow and rain along with damaging wind gusts and some coastal flooding. The problem is the exact track is still in question and therefore even though a large storm will likely form it may only end up grazing us. The timing of this potential storm will be Wednesday.